My tears turn to ash,

my world becomes volcanic

with the noisy eruptions

of suffering,

I'm sleeping on a bed of spines

walking on a carpet of thorns,

oil has been spilt

on my wings of fortitude

The moonlight is spilt

across my day,

a splinter of hope,

this, I must say

is the holy chastity

of furnacious life,

unraped by the

man of success

I've been swallowing sickles,

sweating steel,

and my blood frys, sizzles

on the oven-tray ground,

baked in defeat

There is this gigantic headache,

a grim, ambush of uppercuts,

destiny has hurled at me,

things are so dry

that I begin to sweat out

the vapor of pain.

                                   By Kakraba Afful